Consent for gynaecological procedure: what do women understand and remember?

To determine patients' understanding and recall of consent information and risks associated with their procedure following gynaecological surgery.

Patients planned for routine gynaecological surgery were invited to participate in the study by completing a self-administered questionnaire 4-6 h after day-surgery and 24 h after in-patient surgery. Collated data were analysed using standard statistical methods.

544 women participated in the study. 321 (57.9 %) were day-cases and 233 (42.1 %) were in-patients. 33 % and 30.8 % of in-patients and day-cases, respectively did not recall any risk associated with their procedure. Among in-patients, women who did not recall any risk were less likely to have post primary education (84.2 vs. 96.2 %, P = 0.008), understood an information leaflet (79.5 vs. 95.1 %, P = 0.002), understood the consent counselling (85.5 vs. 98 %, P = 0.001), or remember the explanation of procedure and risks (85.5 vs. 98 %, P = 0.001). Among women who did not recall any risk, the day-case women were less likely to have read the information leaflet (86.4 vs. 96.2 %, P = 0.002), understood the information leaflet (79.5 vs. 98.9 %, P = 0.007), or understood the consent counselling (85.5 vs. 98.9 %, P < 0.001) when compared to in-patients.

A third of women who had planned gynaecology procedure do not recall any risk associated with the procedure. Provision of information leaflet did not make any consistent difference.